endgamer31

made some crazy adjustments to make it a better devotion deck. it is a little different than original but still should be a strong deck. with devotion ive found keeping your creatures alive to be of utmost importance so ive added a regenerating creature and ways to give your creatures undying / a way to just prevent all damage

so..... why no doubling season?

i prefer master biomancer over prime speaker

there are much better creatures that lorescale ( id go with the 0/1 evolve bird, cant remember its name)

for extra fun include more graft cards such as cytoplast root-kin... he basically evolves all your creatures at least once if not twice... damn i love graft.

or if you want to go really balls to the walls....Kalonian Hydra




can you check out my 2 black idea decks.... im trying to decide between 2 strats

http://www.mtgvault.com/endgamer31/decks/black-idea/

http://www.mtgvault.com/endgamer31/decks/black-idea-2/

Nice i made a similar deck but without the elves and much more eldrazi spawns also has thromok.... which might be a good addition here
didnt even consider doubling season which is crazy because i have a deck that uses doubling season!
http://www.mtgvault.com/endgamer31/decks/endgamers-devour/

fortify or break of day seems ok the others not so much, i still think rally the peasants is your best bet for doing a huge amount of damage. also just noticed YOU HAVE NOT FRONTLINE MEDIC WHAT?! lol
2 of those might be good but i can see where they might muck things up if you are going for the kill asap

then go with this one http://www.mtgvault.com/card/rally-the-peasants/ISD/
instant speed and you get flashback. no toughness boost but you get the element of surprise!

i think ill proxy in current version and playtest and see what happens. might be i come back and add more direct damamge

a few things.
righteous charge. you need this. every battalion deck in the world needs this they just don't know it. most times it will swing for at least 6 extra damage, it can easily swing an extra 10-12 it can turn a game were you opponent is certain of victory to a game were they all of a sudden find themselves very dead. i would suggest replacing gather the townsfolk but where ever you can fit it in it will help
also i would more go more for 4 legion loyalists than 4 daring skyjeks or 4 halberdiers but that is just me
angelic skirmisher can also be a very good card in a battalion deck but im not sure if it quite fits in with this particular deck. food for thought though.

hmm ok...

agree:
kargan. (i just really like level up and want to use it some where. i can see how this is not the best place
hellkite. yep too expensive
rite of flame<seething song (for getting out valkas)
one last dragonspeaker
as for counters... maybe dragon blood. but i am more thinking of ring of valkas since i can give a creature haste if need be and it is automatic every turn.

disagree:
why fledgling dragon? i dont see me getting 7 cards into my graveyard very quickly? i would rather have 4 furnace welps.

utvaras.... utvara+valkas=the game is over pretty much no mater what. it is not central to the strategy of the over all deck (hence why i only have 2) but if i do get it the deck becomes silly quite quickly.
i can maybe see getting rid of kiln mouth but he is so good considering my guess is ill have at least 1-2 other dragons in hand anytime i play him.

as far as more direct damage... for what? i have the lightning bolts... do i need more creature removal you think? in that case i would go more with flame slash but i will have to look at how the deck balances out once i make adjustments.
aslo not sure why having 28 creatures is bad... its just a creature based deck...

bonus: what do you think about dragonmaster outcast...i know he is not the best in this instance but he has the potential to be very good.

also id be glad to look at a few of your decks!

they played pretty imba at first but i changed the slumbering dragon to dragon eggsand it has been much smoother. blanch wood armor is very very imba and i think we might want to switch it out for a high toughness reach creature ( ill look at spiders)

I see what you mean. I think what the me is the above deck it's kind of in the middle lol.

.. but valkas counts all your dragons on the field. lets assume a deck more along my line of suggestions. by turn 5 you should have at least 3 if not 4 dragons out (slumbering dragon, dragon hatchling, dragon egg,furnace welp.) now this is obviously a perfect world but you should be able to have at least 2-3 out before he drops giving you a base of at least 3 damage. and by turn 5 one should be playing at least a dragon a turn so...
turn 5 valkas: 3 damage
turn 6 another dragon: 4 damage
turn 7 another : 5 damage
turn 8 another : 6 damage

if he stays out three turns, without any of your creatures attacking and only dropping one dragon a turn, you get 18 damage. now say you have 2-3 dragon drops in your hand that are in the 1-3 CMC ranges... you could see where i would be saying that he is a must. one could hypothetically do that 18 damage in one turn with the right cards in hand.

as far as hatchling goes... i think at the very least he is a 2 drop, that counts as a dragon for the 3 cards that that matters ( valkas, crucible and kilnmouth) as well as i think it would not be uncommon for turn three to not have any plays ( as it is now, there is one creature and seething song, which really cant help you out until turn 4 to get you a total of 6 mana, what most of the dragons cost. if he adds dragon egg it only helps a little bit) so at the very least he is a 2 drop that in most cases he will be a flying 3/1. in addition if he adds slumbering dragon, you really need some chump blockers early on so you don't die straight up. i could see maybe not doing 4 of him but i would have at least 2-3.

for reference here is my dragon deck. comments on it are welcome
http://www.mtgvault.com/endgamer31/decks/dragons/

also something to keep in mind with braid of fire is that you can still play instants during your upkeep so you could use it for a huge instant or one of the instant speed fireballs...

your mana pool drains in between each phase actually. so after your upkeep phase all the mana empties out and you start fresh for your draw phase, so on a so forth. confusing... yes... but true.
there are ways around it though... such as upwelling

i aggree with you on alot but there are a few that i have to disagree.
1.hatchling can be very good especially if you are not drawing your dragons and you are sitting there with your mana up your ass. considering the crucible of fire would also make it a 3/4 i think its pretty good. also counts as a dragon for kilnmouth.
2. pyretic ritual is only meh. rite of flames give you the same amount of mana advantage (+1) but every subsequent one you cast helps with an additional +1. personally i would rather have 4 rite of flames and ony a few geosurge/seething song
3. i agree with adding rorix though it is good to point out that in a mono red deck he is a directly better version of volcanic dragon
4. just made a deck that has 4 dragon eggs and i would encourage you and Leki to strongly consider them. they are much better than they seem.
5. also how could you miss Scourge of Valkas?

i like them too but you have to make sure you have something to back it up or you will just get rolled. if he adds the slumbering dragons i would suggest keeping dragon hatchling

how could one miss this lol def agreed

agreed. rite of flames is much better that pyretic

also
http://www.mtgvault.com/card/comet-storm/WWK/

is another instant x damage card. would probably be better to have 4 of these that 4 fireballs/ disintegrates

also if you are going through the trouble of making bbraid of fire relevant you might want more that 2. just saying

i tend to agree that braid of fire is probably not best used here but i could see how it could help with instants so ill let it be

pyromancer ascension is a card that really wants you to have multiples so you want to focus your spells to have 4 of everything. right off i would drop either fireball or disintegrate (since they are basically the same spell) and do 4 of one of them. then nix chain reaction and do 4 blasphemous acts ( it is almost always going to be a better card)

you could probably nix beacon of destruction as well and give those slots to 2 more browbeats.

i would probably also chose a chandra and do 2 of her instead of 1 of each. they are both very good and you really cant go wrong ( though i hear the M14 one is deceptively good)

if anyone wants to check out and give advice on my mana ramp/ burn deck that would be awesome
http://www.mtgvault.com/endgamer31/decks/forest-fire-help/

decided to go with the timber wall and axebane guardian, figuring that the axe bane can give me a constant red mana and gives me a 3 drop ( most from what ive been looking at i probably am not going to start "fireballing" until around turn 4-5) and the timber wall can give me a temporary mana fix and is a good one drop defender.
instead of adding in more fork like cards i replaced the devils play with fog as another delay tactic. might change that from 4 to 3 and add in one more fork like card but it depends on how the test card draws go.